


red sky at morning

by SuddenlyTentacles



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: Criminal AU, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, GTAverse, Multi, post-Michael's heist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-27
Updated: 2014-05-27
Packaged: 2018-01-26 17:45:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1696952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuddenlyTentacles/pseuds/SuddenlyTentacles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>there in the midst of it so alive and alone, words support like bone.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	red sky at morning

**Author's Note:**

> Suggested Listening: [Mercy Street by Elbow](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ij7fvkFp66M)

Gavin couldn’t say what woke him; the nausea brought on by moments of weightlessness bookended by jarring impacts; the splash and hiss of the ocean; the ache in his head, throbbing in time to his heartbeat; or the restless hand ruffling his hair-- Lindsay’s, he decided. Michael’s was calmer and more methodical, a steady cycle of ruffle-smooth-smooth that could go on for more than an hour. Lindsay was more squirrely, her fingertips massaging circles and hearts and squiggles into his scalp without pause. It stood to reason it was her lap his head was pillowed on as she traced lightning bolts over his temple, his nose brushing her belly and catching whiffs of gunpowder and perfume under the salt-spray. His eyes felt rusted shut, with salt and sleep and the weight of exhaustion. He opened them slowly, painfully, and looked up.

The sky was dim and red with dawn, but Lindsay glowed in a few rays of true sunlight and a halo of her red hair, whipping wildly in the wind. She was grinning fierce and bright, the horizon mirrored in his aviators on her face. Gavin’s heart squeezed at the sight of her, love lodging itself in his throat and making the nausea so much worse.

He flailed and rolled off the boat’s bench seat right onto his ass, then scrambled to his feet, slipped immediately, and landed hard across the side of the boat, already puking. The motor went dead between one heave of his stomach and the next and the boat began to skip slowly to a stop, tossing up less and less spray. Gavin was dizzily grateful, even if his head was already soaked, and then there were hands pawing at his shoulders and waist-- he only went along with them when he was sure there was nothing left in him.

Gavin let Lindsay and Michael turn him, and then he let his legs give out and slumped against the side of the boat, shutting his eyes again and trying to ignore the way they followed him down into twin crouches, just for a moment. It was hard to breathe around the knot in his throat, harder to squash the urge to gag on it like it was a real thing, so he covered his face with both hands and breathed.

He’d seen the rusty stains on the floorboard in his mad scramble for the boat side. He found shattered memories embedded in him like glass, shards of sight and sound and smell that must have fit together somehow. Shouts and shots and the faint sensation of blood spatter came together for him first.

“Did they have to die?” He croaked, hoarse and suddenly dying of thirst. It was an honest question; he’d always been recon, or getaway, or tech, or anything but _in the shit_ with the rest of the crew. Not until Geoff’s heist and the ones after. He _didn’t know_ , and that was the worst part, trying to figure out what the sides _were_ , where the battle lines had even been drawn when he hadn’t been paying attention, never mind figuring out which side he bloody well wanted to be _on_. He dropped his hands and finally looked at Michael, searching his face.

Michael’s mouth stopped moving-- Gavin frowned, he hadn’t heard anything-- and his face didn’t soften, but it turned solemn and sympathetic. The hand on Gavin’s shoulder squeezed.

“Yeah, buddy. Yeah they did.”

It hurt. It was a knife right between his sodding ribs and he cringed away against the side of the boat, curling in on himself and shaking his head, a high pained keen rising up out of his throat and through his teeth. Lindsay’s hand found its way back into his hair, but the circles she rubbed were slower and lower, at the base of his skull where tension was stringing itself tight. Michael was murmuring his name over and over, low and urgent, and took Gavin’s face in both hands, ignoring his grimace.

“Gavin, Gav, please, c’mon, _listen_ \--” Lindsay was shushing him now, soft nonsense noises, and Michael shook Gavin’s head lightly, making his bloody headache even worse. “Listen to me Gav, Geoff was gonna get us all fucking killed, okay? He got us all fucking locked up, he brought fucking _Ryan_ back after he actually fucking betrayed us and goddamn near killed everybody, he brought in fucking _Kerry_ on a heist when the kid’s never so much as fucking mugged anybody, he was bringing _you_ in on heists-- Gavin, he was gonna _kill us all_.” Gavin had placed his hands over Michael’s, prying at them and shaking his head as best he could. It was all true, and Geoff and Kerry and Ryan and Ray were still all dead, and the keen rising in his throat like bile was sharp as a knife.  

“Gavin,” Lindsay said, her voice low and bizarrely gentle, for her. He stilled and looked up, and she brushed Michael’s hand aside to cup his cheek. “We’re going to Tahiti. We’ve got everything we need to lay low until this blows over, then come back and rebuild.” She stroked her thumb over his cheekbone, staring at it instead of meeting his dumbfounded look. “We’ll all be safe, and you can do anything you want when we get there. Understand?”

He didn’t, not for a long moment, until the bittersweet set of her face hit him like a ton of bricks. Gavin grabbed her arm and hauled her forward, fighting not to sob into the crook of her neck as he wrapped her up in a desperate squeeze. The ache in Gavin’s throat sharpened until it felt brittle, until it felt taut and likely to shatter if he tried to speak, so he didn’t bother. There was nothing but the dull roar white noise in his head anyway, his thoughts scattered under the combined weight of grief and fear and love. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and made herself comfortable while he clung to her, straddling his lap and shushing him again, rubbing the nape of his neck. Michael’s hand fell from Gavin’s other cheek to his shoulder, but after a beat Gavin felt it begin to slip off entirely and a fresh bolt of fear struck him like lightning.

He lunged sideways before Michael could stand all the way up, with one arm still curled around Lindsay and the other catching Michael at the knee, and nearly brought him down on top of them. Michael swore and wobbled dangerously, but dropped back into a proper crouch and then tipped forward onto his knees with a thump.

Gavin fisted a hand in the back of his shirt and Lindsay caught him by the nape, and together they reeled him in, nearly dragging him into Lindsay’s lap. Michael went easily, throwing his arms around them and crushing them together against him without a second thought. Gavin tucked his face into the crook of Michael’s neck, shaking his head mutely against it.

“Hey, hey,” Michael’s voice was low and rough with emotion, sounded as calloused as the hands petting Gavin anxiously. “Take it easy, you’re alright.”

It wrenched a dry sob out of Gavin, shattering the tension in his throat. “No,” he gasped, shaking his head harder and faster, “Bollocks, no, don’t-- don’t fucking take off, not without me, _please_ \--”

“What? _Fuck no_ \--” Michael blurted, as Lindsay snapped, _“Hey_ ,” and shook Gavin lightly by his nape. Michael shut up, shaking his head silently and when Lindsay pried Gavin away he caught a glimpse of Michael’s stormy expression before she took his chin in hand and forced him to look her in the eye.

“I said you can do whatever you want, okay? If you still want to stick with us, then you’re with us. Nobody changes that but you, alright?” Gavin sniffled damply and nodded. Lindsay stared into him a moment longer, then gave him a firm nod of approval and let go of his chin to pat his chest affectionately. “Great. You’re gonna love Tahiti, we got the most _amazing_ hotel room ever and we’re gonna buy a real place on a beach after we get everything settled.”

She changed gears from something not far from the skin she wore on the job to the sweet, chipper thing she often was at home, and she did it so quickly it startled a huff of laughter out of him. Michael grinned slowly at the sound of it, and Lindsay beamed at him before hopping onto her feet and holding her hands out to him expectantly. He took them with the barest beginnings of a smile twitching his lips and let her haul him to his feet, up into her space, and from there it was simple to sway forward and duck to fit their mouths together, sweet and easy.

Michael’s arm slipped around his waist from behind and he reeled himself in against Gavin’s back, hooking his chin over Gavin’s shoulder with a pleased hum. The flush of warmth set Gavin’s skin prickling pleasantly and he melted, leaning into Lindsay as she wound her arms around his neck and deepened the kiss. Michael’s hand slid off of his hip and low over his belly, fingers spread wide and warm. He chuckled and pressed a quick kiss to the side of his throat, and then Gavin felt him point to something off in the distance with a jerk of his chin.

“Save it for the hotel, guys. There’s our ride.”

Lindsay broke the kiss and ignored Gavin’s pitiful whine to turn in his arms and look at whatever Michael had pointed out. Gavin pouted briefly, but if he wasn’t busy any more he might as well take a look himself, and he peered out at the horizon over her head.

Something was glinting in the sun, tiny on the horizon, but Michael slipped away and returned with a pair of binoculars for Lindsay in a moment. She took them and after a beat, a slow, sly smirk stretched over her face.

“Oh _yeah_.” She crooned, and Gavin made grab-hands at the binoculars around her, curiosity piqued. She jerked them out of reach, spun out of his arms, and tossed them at him on her way to the bench seat at the back of the boat. He caught them with a minimum of fumbling, and squinted through them.

“Is that a bloody _yacht_?!” He yelped.

“Yup!” Michael declared cheerfully, and Gavin heard the metallic clack of a chamber being checked for a bullet. His head whipped around to find Michael looking his .45 over, and Gavin gaped until Michael glanced up and raised an eyebrow at him.

“Are-- are we going to bloody pirate it?!”

“What? No, that’s Kdin, _he_ pirated it.”

“Oh,” Gavin said, trying not to look entirely crestfallen and failing, by Lindsay’s giggle.

“Cheer up, Gavvers, he might get a bright idea yet. He’s shown a lotta initiative trying to get into the crew.”

“Yeah, I feel like we’ve got the whole mutiny thing down now.” Lindsay chimed in, throwing him a duffle she’d apparently pulled out of a compartment under the seat. He caught it with a grunt and a sharp wave of nausea that rolled through him; faces flashed behind his eyes, laughter and screams in hellish harmony. He closed his eyes tight and swallowed. When the nausea passed, he opened them again, and his mouth slanted into a bright-edged grin.

“Always room for improvement tho, innit?” He said. Michael grinned and clapped him on the shoulder.

“That’s the spirit, Gav.” Lindsay tossed Michael another duffle and strode over to stand beside them with her own on her shoulder. She slipped her hand into Gavin’s and swung them idly as they all watched, and waited for their ship to come in.

 


End file.
